Lifestyle
Everything you need to know about the radical feminist movement that preaches 'no sex'
SEOUL — The election of Donald Trump has sparked a surge of interest in the United States in South Korea’s 4B movement, a radical feminist crusade that preaches the four B’s: bi-hon (no marriage), bi-yeonae (no dating), bi-sekseu (no sex) and bi-chulsan (no childbirth).
Since Nov. 5, there have been more than 500,000 Google searches for “4b movement,” while on TikTok, Instagram and X, support for the cause has been trending among young women voters who are vowing to swear off men.
“Ladies, we need to start considering the 4B movement like the women in South Korea and give America a severely sharp birth rate decline,” read one post on X with over 450,000 likes.
“We can’t let these men have the last laugh… we need to bite back”
“Reminder that the 4B movement, and the separatist movement in general, isn’t just about avoiding men—it’s also about supporting and investing in women,” read another.
Here’s what to know about the movement and its impact in South Korea:
What is the 4B movement and when did it come about?
While its exact origins or founder is unknown, scholars and activists agree that the 4B movement began in South Korea sometime after 2015, as part of a wider wave of youth-led radical feminism popularized through online forums.
Its emergence coincided with several major events that have fueled a wider reckoning of South Korea’s gender inequalities in the workplace and violence against women.
One of these events was the murder of a young woman in a public toilet in Seoul’s wealthy Gangnam district in 2016. The assailant, a 34-year-old male with a history of mental illness, later testified to police that he had stabbed the woman — whom he did not know — because he had been shunned by women in the past.
A woman enters a booth to cast her early vote for a presidential election at a local polling station in Seoul in March 2022.
(Ahn Young-joon/Associated Press)
The movement was spurred further by the #MeToo movement’s arrival in South Korea in 2018, the year that also saw mass public protests against the widespread circulation of nonconsensual pornography.
“For women, love, dating, marriage and childbirth were no longer perceived as refuges of peace and safety, but the site of exposure to male violence and subordination,” feminist scholar Yoon-kim Ji-young wrote in 2020, describing the 4B movement as “the complete severing of any emotional, mental, financial or physical dependence on men.”
In recent years, some adherents have expanded the movement into a variant known as 6B, which also calls for bi-sobi (no consumption of products that endorse misogyny or engage in sexist marketing) and bi-dop-bi — solidarity between unmarried women.
Despite bursts of virality and media coverage, the movement is still far from mainstream, and given its decentralized online existence, there is no concrete data on how many South Korean women actively identify as “4B.”
One of the most common ways for adherents to signal their commitment is to share social media posts with 4B-related hashtags, such as investment tips for women’s financial independence and photographs showcasing happily unmarried lives.
Some cities, Daejeon and Gwangju among them, also have 4B-themed offline communities where followers can socialize through sports, book clubs or skills-building workshops.
Some feminist scholars and activists in South Korea have criticized these lifestyle-oriented aspects of the 4B movement, arguing that individual acts of opting out ultimately do little to meaningfully advance women’s sex and reproductive rights in society at large. “At the center of young women’s commitment to 4B is the desire to focus on themselves,” feminist scholar Cho Joo-hyun wrote in 2020.
“The logical endpoint of that is becoming a successful individual in neoliberal society,”
Where does South Korea stand on gender equality?
By many gender equality metrics, South Korea lags behind much of the industrialized world.
The wage gap between men and women is the largest among the 38-member Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), a group of wealthy countries, with South Korean women paid on average a third less than their male counterparts. In the World Economic Forum’s 2023 Global Gender Gap Index, which measures gender parity across economic opportunities, education, health and political leadership in 146 countries, South Korea is ranked 105th.
Disparities remain stark in the home as well. In households where both spouses work, women spend an average of 187 minutes a day on domestic work while men spend just under one-third of that — 54 minutes — according to government data from 2019.
Violence against women has also been criticized as an area of long neglect. Dating violence has seen a sharp increase in the country of 51 million, rising from 49,225 reported cases in 2020 to 77,150 last year, according to police. In addition, women in the country are victimized by deep-fake pornography at the highest rates in the world, according to an analysis of online content between July and August last year by U.S.-based cyber-security firm Security Hero.
In South Korea’s last election, conservative President Yoon Suk Yeol’s campaign was widely criticized for making misogynist appeals to young male voters, with Yoon denying that structural sexism exists and promising to raise penalties for false rape accusations.
Has the 4B movement managed to pull down South Korea’s birthrate?
Despite claims on social media that the 4B movement is behind South Korea’s dismal fertility rate, there is little evidence to back this up.
South Korea’s fertility rate — the average number of children a woman has in her lifetime — currently sits at 0.72, the lowest in the world and far below the 2.1 needed to maintain a stable population. Like most advanced economies, South Korea’s fertility rate has steadily been falling since 1980. Researchers have attributed its first significant dip in 2001 — to “lowest-low” levels of under 1.3 — to the labor market shocks caused by the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis.
In more recent years, rising housing and child-rearing costs as well as workplace pressures forcing women to choose between motherhood and their careers have driven the figure down even further.
And while it is true that young South Koreans are increasingly disillusioned with marriage in favor of childless or single lifestyles, these changes are not exclusive to women. Today, just 28% of South Korean women and 42% of men in their 20s see marriage as necessary, dropping from around 50% and 70% in 2008, according to government data.
Lifestyle
In ‘No Other Choice,’ a loyal worker gets the ax — and starts chopping
Lee Byung-hun stars in No Other Choice.
NEON
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NEON
In an old Kids in the Hall comedy sketch called “Crazy Love,” two bros throatily proclaim their “love of all women” and declare their incredulity that anyone could possibly take issue with it:
Bro 1: It is in our very makeup; we cannot change who we are!
Bro 2: No! To change would mean … (beat) … to make an effort.
I thought about that particular exchange a lot, watching Park Chan-wook’s latest movie, a niftily nasty piece of work called No Other Choice. The film isn’t about the toxic lecherousness of boy-men, the way that KITH sketch is. But it is very much about men, and that last bit: the annoyed astonishment of learning that you’re expected to change something about yourself that you consider essential, and the extreme lengths you’ll go to avoid doing that hard work.
Many critics have noted No Other Choice‘s satirical, up-the-minute universality, given that it involves a faceless company screwing over a hardworking, loyal employee. As the film opens, Man-su (Lee Byung-hun) has been working at a paper factory for 25 years; he’s got the perfect job, the perfect house, the perfect family — you see where this is going, right? (If you don’t, even after the end of the first scene, when Man-su calls his family over for a group hug while sighing, “I’ve got it all,” then I envy your blithe disinterest in how movies work. Never change, you beautiful blissful Pollyanna, you.)
He gets canned, and can’t seem to find another job in his beloved paper industry, despite going on a series of dehumanizing interviews. His resourceful wife Miri (Son Ye-jin) proves a hell of a lot more adaptable than he does, making practical changes to the family’s expenses to weather Man-su’s situation. But when foreclosure threatens, he resolves to eliminate the other candidates (Lee Sung-min, Cha Seung-won) for the job he wants at another paper factory — and, while he’s at it, maybe even the jerk (Park Hee-soon) to whom he’d be reporting.
So yes, No Other Choice is a scathing spoof of corporate culture. But the director’s true satirical eye is trained on the interpersonal — specifically the intractability of the male ego.
Again and again, the women in the film (both Son Ye-jin as Miri and the hilarious Yeom Hye-ran, who plays the wife of one of Man-su’s potential victims) entreat their husbands to think about doing something, anything else with their lives. But these men have come to equate their years of service with a pot-committed core identity as men and breadwinners; they cling to their old lives and seek only to claw their way back into them. Man-su, for example, unthinkingly channels the energy that he could devote to personal and professional growth into planning and executing a series of ludicrously sloppy murders.
It’s all satisfyingly pulpy stuff, loaded with showy, cinematic homages to old-school suspense cinematography and editing — cross-fades, reverse-angles and jump cuts that are deliberately and unapologetically Hitchcockian. That deliberateness turns out to be reassuring and crowd-pleasing; if you’re tired of tidy visual austerity, of films that look like TV, the lushness on display here will have you leaning back in your seat thinking, “This right here is cinema, goddammit.”
Narratively, the film is loaded with winking jokes and callbacks that reward repeat viewing. Count the number of times that various characters attempt to dodge personal responsibility by sprinkling the movie’s title into their dialogue. Wonder why one character invokes the peculiar image of a madwoman screaming in the woods and then, only a few scenes later, finds herself chasing someone through the woods, screaming. Marvel at Man-su’s family home, a beautifully ugly blend of traditional French-style architecture with lumpy Brutalist touches like exposed concrete balconies jutting out from every wall.
There’s a lot that’s charming about No Other Choice, which might seem an odd thing to note about such a blistering anti-capitalist screed. But the director is careful to remind us at all turns where the responsibility truly lies; say what you will about systemic economic pressure, the blood stays resolutely on Man-su’s hands (and face, and shirt, and pants, and shoes). The film repeatedly offers him the ability to opt out of the system, to abandon his resolve that he must return to the life he once knew, exactly as he knew it.
Man-su could do that, but he won’t, because to change would mean to make an effort — and ultimately men would rather embark upon a bloody murder spree than go to therapy.
Lifestyle
Austin airport to nearly double in size over next decade
AUSTIN, Texas – Austin-Bergstrom International Airport will nearly double in size over the next decade.
The airport currently has 34 gates. With the expansion projects, it will increase by another 32 gates.
What they’re saying:
Southwest, Delta, United, American, Alaska, FedEx, and UPS have signed 10-year use-and lease agreements, which outline how they operate at the airport, including with the expansion.
“This provides the financial foundation that will support our day-to-day operations and help us fund the expansion program that will reshape how millions of travelers experience AUS for decades to come,” Ghizlane Badawi, CEO of Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, said.
Concourse B, which is in the design phase, will have 26 gates, estimated to open in the 2030s. Southwest Airlines will be the main tenant with 18 gates, United Airlines will have five gates, and three gates will be for common use. There will be a tunnel that connects to Concourse B.
“If you give us the gates, we will bring the planes,” Adam Decaire, senior VP of Network Planning & Network Operations Control at Southwest Airlines said.
“As part of growing the airport, you see that it’s not just us that’s bragging about the success we’re having. It’s the airlines that want to use this airport, and they see advantage in their business model of being part of this airport, and that’s why they’re growing the number of gates they’re using,” Mayor Kirk Watson said.
Dig deeper:
The airport will also redevelop the existing Barbara Jordan Terminal, including the ticket counters, security checkpoints, and baggage claim. Concourse A will be home to Delta Air Lines with 15 gates. American Airlines will have nine gates, and Alaska Airlines will have one gate. There will be eight common-use gates.
“Delta is making a long-term investment in Austin-Bergstrom that will transform travel for years to come,” Holden Shannon, senior VP for Corporate Real Estate at Delta Air Lines said.
The airport will also build Concourse M — six additional gates to increase capacity as early as 2027. There will be a shuttle between that and the Barbara Jordan Terminal. Concourse M will help with capacity during phases of construction.
There will also be a new Arrivals and Departures Hall, with more concessions and amenities. They’re also working to bring rideshare pickup closer to the terminal.
City officials say these projects will bring more jobs.
The expansion is estimated to cost $5 billion — none of which comes from taxpayer dollars. This comes from airport revenue, possible proceeds, and FAA grants.
“We’re seeing airlines really step up to ensure they are sharing in the infrastructure costs at no cost to Austin taxpayers, and so we’re very excited about that as well,” Council Member Vanessa Fuentes (District 2) said.
The Source: Information from interviews conducted by FOX 7 Austin’s Angela Shen
Lifestyle
After years of avoiding the ER, Noah Wyle feels ‘right at home’ in ‘The Pitt’
Wyle, who spent 11 seasons on ER, returns to the hospital in The Pitt. Now in Season 2, the HBO series has earned praise for its depiction of the medical field. Originally broadcast April 21, 2025.
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After years of avoiding the ER, Noah Wyle feels ‘right at home’ in ‘The Pitt’
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